ISLAMABAD: Pakistani woman Namira Salim won laurels for the country when she hoisted the green-and-white Pakistani flag at the North Pole.An Indonesian fisherman named Dede who feared that he would be killed by tree-like growths covering his body has been given hope of recovery by an American doctor - and Vitamin A.
The welts spread across his body unchecked and soon he was left unable to carry out everyday household tasks.
Sacked from his job and deserted by his wife, Dede has been raising his two children - now in their late teens - in poverty, resigned to the fact that local doctors had no cure for his condition.
To make ends meet he even joined a local “freak show”, parading in front of a paying audience alongside victims of other peculiar diseases.
Although supported by his extended family, he was often a target of abuse and ridicule in his rural fishing village.
But now an American dermatology expert who flew out to Dede’s home village south of the capital Jakarta claims to have identified his condition, and proposed a treatment that could transform his life.
After testing samples of the lesions and Dede’s blood, Dr Anthony Gaspari of the University of Maryland concluded that his affliction is caused by the Human Papilloma Virus (HPV), a fairly common infection that usually causes small warts to develop on sufferers.
The first pictures taken by the Messenger probe as it passed Mercury on Monday have started to arrive at Earth.They include images that show parts of the surface missed by the Mariner 10 spacecraft when it flew by the planet in the 1970s.
Like the previously mapped portions of Mercury, the new sections appear heavily cratered.
Messenger needs to perform another two fly-bys and a number of engine firings to get itself into orbit in 2011.
Monday's manoeuvre took the probe to within just 200km (125 miles) of the planet at closest approach.
Messenger was programmed to collect more than 1,300 images and make other observations during the encounter.
The 700GB of data began transmission to Earth on Tuesday.
US soul legend Ike Turner, who died last month at the age of 76, was killed by a cocaine overdose, Californian coroners have established. "We are listing that he abused cocaine and that's what resulted in the cocaine toxicity," said an official at the San Diego County medical examiner's office.
Cardiovascular disease and pulmonary emphysema were also given as "significant" factors in the death.
Turner's daughter Mia said she was shocked by the report.
The singer had waged an "ongoing struggle" with drugs, she said, but the coroner was "overstating the situation".
"Daddy at that point was not doing drugs to the level it leads to believe," she told the North County Times in a telephone interview.
The former husband of Tina Turner died at his home near San Diego on 12 December.
Paul Parker, chief investigator at the medical examiner's office, was quoted by The Associated Press as saying hypertensive cardiovascular disease and pulmonary emphysema were also "significant and contributing factors" in Turner's death.
Rising to fame in the 1960s, the musician is best remembered for his musical partnership with Tina.
Their stormy marriage, in which she said he abused her, overshadowed his considerable achievements in popular music.
A man rides through a bonfire in San Bartolome de Pinares in Spain. Horses are ridden through bonfires on the eve of the Festival of San Anton, the patron saint of animals.